The acquisition has already been approved by the board of directors of both companies and is now subject to customary closing conditions.
After completion of the transaction, Navteq’s current map data business will continue operationally independent, but organizationally a Nokia Group company. Judson Green will report directly to Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo.
Nokia hopes that the purchase of Navteq will allow it to strengthen its location based services offering, as well as offering a boost to the context aware Nokia Internet services.
"Location based services are one of the cornerstones of Nokia’s Internet services strategy. The acquisition of Navteq is another step toward Nokia becoming a leading player in this space," said Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, President and CEO, Nokia. "By joining forces with Navteq, we will be able to bring context and geographical information to a number of our Internet services with accelerated time to market. We also look forward to maintaining and enhancing the services and support provided to Navteq’s existing and future customers," he added.
The acquisition is expected to close in the first quarter of 2008.